


Tidings of Comfort

by jellybabiestomanual



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Christmas, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Spoilers for Episode: s09e09 Holy Terror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-24
Updated: 2013-12-24
Packaged: 2018-01-05 21:28:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,203
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1098775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jellybabiestomanual/pseuds/jellybabiestomanual
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“Everyone’s gone, Cas.  Everyone.”</i>
</p>
<p> </p>
<p>In which Christmas dinner is limp cheeseburgers, Dean breaks down, and Castiel stays.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tidings of Comfort

**Author's Note:**

> cross posted on my [tumblr](http://teamfreesnuggles.tumblr.com/post/71009990342/tidings-of-comfort).

Dean didn’t really have a knack for cookie-cutter-perfect holidays, so it kinda figured that he was spending Christmas at a shabby diner, ordering cheeseburgers with an angel. Sure, the surroundings wouldn’t have made their way onto any self-respecting Hallmark card, but up until a few weeks ago he’d seen a scene like this in some of his favorite daydreams.  
  
Of course, that was before Kevin, before Sam, before everything fell inexorably to shit.  
  
Dean gulped his water, hoping that it would make the inside of his mouth taste less like cotton balls. It didn’t.  
  
The waitress clicked her pen and walked off to put in their order, heels audibly striking the floor in the near-empty diner. Dean finally looked Castiel in the eye and couldn’t look away.  
  
“So, um,” he started, because dammit, he was _not_ going to have a _moment_ when they were separated by a slab of formica and being auditorily assaulted by some godawful sappy holiday song about shoes, “how’s the detective work going? You got any leads on Sam yet?”  
  
Castiel’s face fell, almost imperceptibly. “Dean, I’m sorry. I cannot manipulate this grace as well as I could my own. Searching for your brother is taking an unexpected amount of time.” He shifted in his seat and looked down. “Was that why you wanted to meet?”  
  
“No, man!” Dean protested. “C’mon, can’t I just want to hang out with my best friend on Christmas? I don’t always have an ulterior motive, you know.”  
  
Castiel didn’t look happy with his answer, though; instead, a flash of pain made its way across his face.  
  
“Of course,” he said quietly. “These last weeks were difficult for you. You find my presence comforting. I apologize for my assumption, it was unfair.” He paused, then added, “I did not know Kevin well, but he was a dutiful prophet and he meant a great deal to you, which makes him mean a great deal to me. He was taken too soon.”  
  
Dean’s hands were resting on the thin paper placemat, and he didn’t realize how badly they were shaking until they were covered by Castiel’s warm, steady hands, and something inside him broke.  
  
“He was so young, God, he was just a kid. He was just a kid and he was _out_ but we dragged him back in with that goddamn angel tablet. He had dreams, y’know? Always wanted to make something of himself. Used to tell me and Sam that he was gonna be the first Asian-American president, well, look how that turned out.” The table became blurred. “This life takes everyone away from me, and I’m fucking selfish to even be thinking that way when that _kid_ is dead, but I can’t help it, and I can’t, I _can’t_ anymore.”  
  
Dean didn’t know when he’d started crying, but his throat had closed up enough that he had to force words out with shallow breaths, tears coursing down his face in that small Kansas diner, emotions, for once, on vivid display to all the people around him. Castiel slid out of his own booth and sat down next to Dean, moving one of his arms around Dean’s shoulders but keeping one hand on Dean’s shaking fingers, thumb gently stroking his knuckles. When Dean gulped in air and scrubbed at his eyes enough to see his friend’s face, Castiel didn’t look bewildered by the atypical display of human feeling, nor was he tilting his head with an expression of angelic aloofness. He regarded Dean with something much softer than that, an understanding borne of an intimate familiarity with human loss and suffering.  
  
“Dean Winchester, you are many things, but selfish is not one of them.” Castiel’s voice is soft but firm. “You are and have always been the best man I have ever known, and your mistaken idea that you are not allowed to feel for yourself saddens me more than I can describe. You have lost more loved ones than any person should ever have to. It is natural to grieve for yourself, Dean.”  
  
Dean shook his head helplessly, tears still streaming. “And Sam, fuck, Sammy’s gone, he could be dead for all I know. And there’s nothing I can do.” A fork clinked against a plate behind him and he forced himself to calm down, suddenly conscious of the strangers around him, of their eyes on him. “I’ve called everyone I know and asked them to keep an eye out and I’ve been reading all the news reports I can get my hands on but there’s nothing and there’s never gonna be anything, not if that son of a bitch riding him wants to hide.” Dean took a deep, shuddering breath. “Everyone’s gone, Cas. Everyone.”  
  
“I’m not,” Castiel replied, hands gripping tighter. “I’m not gone, Dean, and I won’t be.”  
  
A laugh tore its way out of Dean’s throat as their waitress walked over. She carefully placed their burgers on the table before hastening away, likely having heard enough of the conversation to realize that interruptions were not welcome. Castiel pulled his hands back to eat, and Dean’s skin burned with the absence.  
  
Dean was a few bites into his burger before he could manage a response. “You’re here now, but for how long? Look, man, no offense, but you don’t really have a great record of sticking around.”  
  
“I give you my word, I will be here as long as you want me,” Castiel said, and somehow his words had so much more weight than they should; this immortal soldier of God pledging himself to a broken creature of earth and death, and Dean took his word because he wanted to, because he needed to. He nodded, jerkily, eyes and throat still raw.  
  
“Okay.” Dean took a deep breath. “Yeah, Cas. Okay.”  
  
And that was that.  
  
Dean looked down at the remains of his dinner.  
  
“Eight dollars for this piece-of-crap cheeseburger and I’m not even hungry,” he groused, and he watched as Castiel’s lips quirked up in a slight smile. “What do you say we blow this popsicle stand and head back to the bunker? I think I’ve got some eggnog left and there’s a 24-hour marathon of _A Christmas Story_ playing. If you’re gonna be staying, you’d better start getting up on pop culture, dude.”  
  
It was lucky for Dean that the two of them had spent so long speaking in subtext, because, while he couldn’t verbalize how very much he wanted Cas with him and would never stop wanting him, Castiel knew. He knew, and he understood, and he wasn’t going to leave. Dean broke all the speed limits on the way back to the bunker and it felt like flying.  
  
He wasn’t quite okay, and wouldn’t be for a long time. He wouldn’t be until he could find and fix Sam, and until he could close his eyes without seeing Kevin’s eyeless corpse behind his eyelids. But that Christmas night, watching a movie with Castiel’s head on his shoulder and his hand a steady grounding pressure on Dean’s knee, Dean felt for the first time in a long time like he could be okay, one day.  
  
It felt like comfort, and it felt like the faintest whisper of joy.


End file.
